Shadow Games
by pale rose fire
Summary: Kuroko's hobby of people watching has evolved into the ability to do Sherlock Scans and predict crimes. Kagami and the rest of Seirin have no idea what they've gotten themselves into. Chapter 6: Kuroko finds himself on a hunt to save a woman who was kidnapped after he stumbles upon the site of her abduction.
1. First Games

**First Games**

Summary: Kuroko realizes that the convenience store he and Kagami are in is about to be held up. Kagami realizes that Kuroko has an incredible gift.

(This fic is set in an AU where Kuroko's hobby of people-watching has evolved into the ability to do Sherlock Scans and notice details that the majority of the world would overlook. His own moral code forces him to act when he sees something wrong happening, and the boatload of psychological issues he's been carrying since middle school have been twisted too, causing him to take dangerous risks and act self destructively at times)

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><p>"Kagami-kun. Please listen."<p>

The tone that Kuroko used, more than his words, got Kagami's attention. He would have paid attention to what Kuroko was saying anyway. He and Kuroko were getting to be good friends, and he'd come to realize that the boy who'd promised to be his shadow and help him defeat the Generation of Miracles was grotesquely overlooked in day to day life, by the world at large. Kagami made it a point to hang out with Kuroko outside of school because it was clear the kid had no one, and Kagami intimidated most people to the point where he didn't really have anyone either. But if Kuroko was specifically asking for attention, he would obviously give it to him. But his tone was now urgent in a way Kagami had never heard Kuroko sound before. It was similar to the one Kuroko used when he had something important to say on the basketball court, but way more intense.

Immediately, Kagami's guard went up. "What's wrong?"

"The man in the black hoodie is about to hold up this convenience store with a fake gun. Please go punch him in the face and stop him."

Kagami couldn't help it. He stared dumbly at Kuroko and tried to make sense of the words. "Sorry, Kuroko, my Japanese is rusty. I don't think I understood what you said right."

"The man in the black hoodie." Kuroko motioned toward him urgently. "He's a failed manga artist who's on the verge of being evicted from his apartment if he misses another payment, and he's about to try to rob this convenience store with a fake gun. So please go punch him in the face and stop him."

"Say that one more time," requested Kagami.

"There's no time!" Kuroko's expression changed as he tracked the guy he believed was about to rob the convenience store. The man had just started toward the registers, after the last customer in line had checked out, and Kuroko's expression changed to one that said he thought he was going to have to do this by himself. He, as well, started toward the registers.

Kagami didn't know what to do. On the one hand, Kuroko wasn't the kind of guy to fly off the handle and make something like this up. On the other, how could Kuroko possibly know any of that?

"Open the register! Give me all your money!"

Kagami gawked.

What Kuroko had just predicted was going to happen had just happened.

Behind the register, the cashier stood frozen. The gun that was trained on him looked very, very real. Kagami wouldn't put bets on it being fake. And Kagami knew what guns looked like. He'd grown up in America. He'd seen real guns before. Hell, he owned one, even though handguns were illegal in Japan. And if this one was fake, it was a very, very realistic fake.

"Please stop."

"Whah!" the robber jumped as Kuroko seemingly appeared right next to him out of nowhere.

"It's wrong to take other peoples' money," said Kuroko in his usual deadpan.

"Sh-shut up! Or I'll blow your brains out you stupid kid!" the man shouted, turning his gun on Kuroko.

"You won't," said Kuroko. "You can't. Your gun is an artist's replica."

"It's not a replica!" shouted the robber. "It's a real gun."

"It's not," Kuroko said.

"It is!"

"Then please shoot me."

By this time Kagami was grinding his teeth, but afraid to move forward with that very real looking gun aimed right at Kuroko's head. His heart was beating out of control and he just knew that he was going to have nightmares about this, whether Kuroko survived this or not.

The robber stood frozen except for his shaking hands, and shaking gun, which he still had pointed at Kuroko. He didn't shoot him, thank God, but you could see the desperation building in his eyes.

Kagami realized what the robber was going to do a second before he did it. He lunged forward, but he was too far away. The robber pistol whipped Kuroko across the face. Fake gun or not, it still seemed very solid, and Kuroko went down.

"Bastard!"

Kagami crashed into the would-be robber, slamming into him and knocking him right into a snack rack. Their momentum and combined weight toppled the snack rack, and the magazine rack on the other side of it. The gun fell from the robber's hand, and Kagami knocked it out of both their reach, then proceeded to lay into the man with his fists, pummeling him furiously, taking revenge for his shadow.

"You don't touch him! You don't point a fucking gun at him! Not my friend, you bastard!"

"Kagami-kun . . . I think that's enough, Kagami-kun."

Kuroko's voice snapped Kagami out of his rage. He looked up and saw Kuroko on his feet. He had his hand held to his forehead, over his right eye. Blood was dripping down his face, giving Kagmi an infuriatingly worried feeling of déjà vu.

When he looked down at the man he was pummeling, Kagami saw that the would-be robber seemed to have lost consciousness. Kagami made a disgusted noise and punched him once more before letting him fall to the floor. Then he stood and moved toward Kuroko.

"You're hurt."

"I'll be alright," said Kuroko.

"You're going to the hospital."

"I don't need –"

"That's the second time this month you've been hit in the head. You're getting checked out for it," growled Kagami. He tried to remember what Coach and Captain had done when this happened before. Then there was the extra factor of the robber to be taken into consideration. He turned to the convenience store's employee. "Call the police. Then get a first aid kit."

"I think the robber got off worse than I did," said Kuroko.

"He got off easy," Kagami growled. Nobody touched his friends and got off free.

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><p>They stuck around until the police came. Then they had to answer some questions. The security footage confirmed everything they told the two detectives had happened. The detectives watched it on the premises and made a copy of it for evidence to be used at trial. That should have been the end of their involvement, but after watching the security footage, the younger of the two detectives came back to address Kuroko.<p>

"You were moving to intervene before that man pulled his gun."

Kagami and Kuroko had both left out the fact that Kuroko seemed to know beforehand what was going to happen. Kuroko had only told what happened after the man pulled the fake gun. Not that he'd known beforehand and tried to get Kagami to stop him before it could happen. Kagami hadn't revealed that either, since Kuroko hadn't. He'd planned on asking Kuroko about it later but it seemed he'd be getting his answers now.

"Yes. I was," deadpanned Kuroko.

"Why?" asked the detective, who'd introduced himself as Detective Yagami, seeming unphased by Kuroko's short answer.

"Because I knew he was going to pull out a fake gun."

"How could you have known that?" demanded Yagami's partner, one Detective Matsuda. "Unless you were an accomplice?"

"No," Kuroko said immediately, and Kagami only knew he was worried because he was starting to get to know Kuroko.

"If you confess everything you know –"

"Let the kid speak, Matsuda," Yagami cut him off. "Kuroko-kun, can you tell me how you knew what was going to happen?"

Kuroko stared at Yagami for a moment, his eyes intense. Then he spoke. "I realized that the suspect was an out of work manga artist on the verge of being evicted from his apartment if he missed another payment, and realized that he intended to rob the convenience store to try to prevent that. So, I wanted to stop him."

"How could you possibly know that unless you were in league –"

"Kuroko-kun, please tell us how you knew this," Yagami said, cutting his partner off again.

"His hands gave him away as a manga artist," said Kuroko. "He had pressure calluses on his right hand, in the right places for someone who spends a lot of time drawing, and a scrap of screen tone stuck to his wrist."

"A bit of a giveaway," Yagami agreed. "But very observant of you to notice. And how did you know he was about to be evicted?"

"His eviction notice was sticking out of his back pocket. I saw it. I read the visible part of it. That's all," said Kuroko.

"And the gun?" Yagami asked. "Or rather, the fake gun?"

"The sticker was stuck to his shoe."

"What sticker?" asked Matsuda.

"The one that comes with artist replicas of weapons," Yagami answered him. "They hasten things along a little bit when they're checked by security at customs, or conventions, or anywhere else they might be sold. You should know this, Matsuda."

His partner colored, clearly embarrassed.

"And you noticed all that?" asked Kagami, a little amazed. "And you put it together . . . that's how you knew?"

"I didn't do anything wrong," said Kuroko.

"No, you didn't," agreed Yagami.

"Actually, yes you did," growled Kagami. "What the hell were you thinking, confronting someone twice your size? Again?! At least there was only one this time, but still, do you have no self preservation at all?"

"I couldn't stand by and do nothing. That would have been wrong," said Kuroko.

Kagami grimaced. "That doesn't mean it's alright to confront a full grown man twice your size! Don't do that again!"

"I have the feeling you're the kind of person this is going to happen to again, Kuroko-kun," said Yagami.

Kagami glared at the detective. "Don't encourage him!"

Yagami gave Kagami an amused look, then handed a business card to Kuroko, who took it, his expression still blank, but Kagami sensed he was confused. Yagami must have sensed so too, because he explained, "In case you notice anything else."

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><p>(this fic is set in the same universe as the "Kuroko no Sherlock" oneshot, which is Chapter 3 of my oneshot collection fic, "A Different Side of Me,"<br>so if you liked this, please check that out too)

(Detective Yagami Light and Detective Matsuda have been borrowed from Death Note because they're convenient premade characters, and I fail at OCs. No Death Notes or incarnations of Kira will be appearing in this fic.)

Please review!


	2. The Pickpocket Problem

The Pickpocket Problem

Summary: The rest of Seirin learns about Kuroko's abilities, and gets on board with the crimebusting.

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><p>Kuroko wasn't sure when he first started to know things that other people didn't. Maybe he'd always been like that. He just hadn't known that other people weren't on the same page as him until he was in middle school. It wasn't like he talked with people that much. Until Ogiwara-kun, he hadn't had a single friend in elementary school.<p>

Watching other people had always been his hobby. They never felt his envious stare as they walked home with their friends, or rushed off to work, or left work and loitered, delaying the time until they were reunited with their families.

His gift had to be an evolved form of his hobby, Kuroko theorized, when he realized that other people couldn't do what he could do, couldn't look at someone and read their life from the clues they so obviously left on their persons. Bookkeepers, marketing executives, divorce attorneys, chefs . . . everyone wore their jobs on their sleeves. Not literally. At least not in most cases. But they might as well have, for as obvious as it all was to Kuroko.

Eventually, he could read not only them, but their families as well, from the NEET who was living off his parents, to the harried mother of at least three children, rushing off to get the shopping done. And then he learned to read their secrets. The adulterers were so careless with their rings. The alcoholics always had scratches on their phones around the power connections.

Some days he'd sit in a subway station for hours, just watching people come and go. It wasn't lonely, he told himself. How could he be lonely when he knew so many people and their secrets?

Then, one day, Kuroko realized he not only knew who and what people were, but also what they were going to do. Not always, he wasn't psychic, and people didn't always telegraph their intentions, but sometimes he'd look at someone, and realize that he knew what they were about to do. Whenever that happened and he got that feeling, it turned out that he was always right.

He saw small things that he didn't think were right, like shop liftings, drug deals, and pick pocketing, but for years, he left it alone. They didn't overly concern him. And no one who he cared about was really getting hurt.

Then his middle school team won their third consecutive championship, and Kuroko learned just what silence and inaction could cost. And he realized, thanks to his ex-captain, that if he didn't speak up or do something when he saw people who meant very little or nothing to him being hurt, he didn't really have a right to say anything when the people he did care about ended up hurt by the exact same things.

And so Kuroko decided never to make that mistake again.

* * *

><p>The first time he tried to act on his newfound resolve, he almost got beaten up by five punks on a Kawagawa streetball court. If Kagami and Kise hadn't intervened, that's probably what would have happened. Kuroko hadn't stopped to think about consequences when he stepped in, but if he had, he would have realized that more likely than not, at least one of those two would intervene.<p>

There was a time when he would have been certain Kise would have jumped in to defend him. But now he wasn't certain anymore. He couldn't be certain when it came to Kise, because once he'd thought all his friends would always be there for each other, but then he'd ended up alone.

Kagami, Kuroko didn't know as well. But he was learning more about him. And what he learned, he liked. Kagami was very passionate, and had strong opinions about what was right and wrong as well. He effortlessly brushed aside the doubts that Kise had made Kuroko feel about their friendship, with gruff logic. Despite what Kise believed, Kuroko was coming to feel like he could count on Kagami, off the court as well as on.

The next time Kuroko knew something was going to happen and decided to do something about it, he did try to turn to Kagami for help first. But as he feared, Kagami thought that he was nuts for singling out what to him must have been a random person, saying that he was going to rob the convenience store, and asking him to go punch him in the face.

Kuroko ended up having to make a move on his own. It could have gone better. Getting pistol whipped by the fake gun was the second worst of the seven scenarios Kuroko felt were likely to occur. (And this time he had thought to calculate the consequences) But the second he went down, Kagami charged in, furious and out for blood.

It was a good feeling, knowing someone wanted to protect him.

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><p>The next time Kuroko realized something was about to happen, that he could stop, worked out better.<p>

"Kagami-kun," he said, letting a little bit of urgency into his voice, "please listen."

The rest of Seirin was there too, but Kagami was the only one who might believe Kuroko when he told them what was about to happen. The others, Kuroko had realized, would need to be shown that Kuroko really could predict these things before they would help him.

His tone caught everyone's attention, but only Kagami could have recognized it for what it was.

"What do you need?" he demanded, moving closer to Kuroko and looking around them, as though trying to spot any threats.

"That woman with the green hair is about to pick pocket the business man buying a pretzel. The one in the grey suit. She'll strike when he puts his wallet back in his pocket."

"I'm on it," said Kagami, immediately taking off.

"Wait, what?" asked Hyuuga.

"Kagami-kun, where are you going? Kuroko-kun, you can't possibly know that," Riko protested.

"He knows things," Kagami called back.

All the rest of the team looked back and forth between them, clearly unsure about what to think. Kuroko kept his eyes on the scene that was about to unfold, and when it happened, most of the others had fixed their eyes on it as well. The grey suited businessman put his wallet back into his back pocket. The green haired pick pocket relieved him of it, easy as pie.

Then Kagami grabbed her wrist before she could make the wallet vanish.

"Give the man back his wallet, lady."

"I'm not – I didn't – let go of me!" the woman stuttered.

"Then let go of that man's wallet!" said Kagami.

"Hey, that's my wallet!" said the businessman, turning around and seeing what the commotion was about.

"If she gets away from Kagami-kun, she's going to try to make a getaway down the stairs," Kuroko predicted. "And she is going to get away from Kagami-kun."

He was surprised but pleased when Mitobe immediately began moving to block off the stairs, with Koganei right behind him. Right as the green haired woman dropped the wallet and pulled away from Kagami with all her might. Kagami didn't have the resolve to hold onto a scared woman, even if she was a petty thief. He didn't deliberately let her go, but he didn't go out of his way to hold her either.

A police officer was running toward them now, but he wouldn't have made it in time to get the woman before she rushed down the stairs. Mitobe barely made it in time to block off her retreat. But he did make it. She skidded to a stop right in front of him when he held his arms out like he was blocking her in a basketball game. She turned to go a different way, but Koganei was there, blocking her as well.

Then the officer reached them. The woman got handcuffed. Statements got taken. Kuroko did what he did best then, and disappeared. He hadn't done anything. He didn't want to have to talk to people because of that.

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><p>Fifteen minutes later, he had to face his team again. He was a little worried about how they would react, but they didn't seem too upset at his desertion. Or his uncanny ability to predict criminal behavior.<p>

"There was a Detective Yagami asking about you, Kuroko-kun," said Riko, looking at him with shrewd eyes.

Kuroko looked at Kagami.

"He heard my name mentioned on the police scanner, so he stopped by," said Kagami. "It wasn't his case. He just wanted to see if you were involved too."

"Did you tell him I was?"

"I didn't have to."

"Why did you disappear, Kuroko?" asked Koganei. "Don't you want people to know you're a hero?"

"I'm not a hero," said Kuroko. "I didn't do anything."

"You put the play into motion," said Izuki. "Without you, that woman would have gotten away with the guy's wallet."

"And that manga artist turned robber would of succeeded in robbing that convenience store," said Kagami. (The whole team had been briefed on that incident back when it happened. Kuroko's head injury had to be explained to the coach and captain.)

Those little bits of good weren't nearly enough to balance out all the bad that had happened when Kuroko stood by and did nothing. But they were a start. And this time Kuroko was with people who would listen to him when he spoke up about what he thought was wrong. So maybe, just maybe, he could eventually tip the scales. Maybe someday he could be a hero.

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><p>Next chapter will be the incident mentioned in the Kuroko no Sherlock oneshot, where Kuroko almost voluntarily swallows poison, or at least a pill that has a 50 percent chance of being poison. And the boatload of psychological issues he's been carrying around since middle school really start to rear their heads. WARNING: Next chapter will be heavily based off the plot of Sherlock Season 1 Episode 1, and the Sherlock Pilot. There will be spoilers.<p>

Please review!


	3. A Study In Shadows

A Study in Shadows

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><p>Summary: Kuroko investigates a string of serial suicides and finds himself on the trail of a serial killer. (This chapter is the incident mentioned in the Kuroko no Sherlock oneshot)<p>

Spoiler Warning: Spoilers for the BBC's Sherlock, Episode 1 and the Unaired Pilot Episode. The following plot is heavily based off of these. No copyright infringement intended.

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><p>Suicides were a sore point for Kuroko.<p>

He could understand desperation. He knew what it was like to watch everything you cared about fall apart. And he recognized that while he had suffered hardships, there were people out there who had been through much, much worse.

But he didn't believe in giving up.

That was why the string of serial suicides caught his attention.

He thought the first one sounded strange – a man, seemingly happy, with no apparent problems, no financial problems, and a loving family, suddenly taking his own life. In a place where he had no reason to be. With poison.

Japan's suicide rate was so high that no one else gave it too much thought, but something about it bothered Kuroko.

When he heard about the suicide of the Seihou benchwarmer, a chill went down his spine. Guilt was like an old friend to him by now, but this was different. This time it didn't connect. The guy was a benchwarmer who hadn't even played in the match Seirin beat them in. And he was a second year. He would have had another shot against them next year. And his other teammates said that he hadn't seemed that crushed after the match. He'd stayed to watch Seirin's battle with Shuutoku, and even cheered Seirin on.

Then he declined to go out to eat with the team after the match, saying he had a test to study for. Then he went to an abandoned office building nowhere near the Seihou dorms or any of his normal hangouts, and killed himself. With the same poison that the businessman from a week ago had.

Something's wrong here. A little voice kept nagging Kuroko about it and wouldn't leave him alone. After he found out about that second suicide, literally, not an hour passed that he didn't think about them, for the next forty-eight hours. His victory over Midorima suddenly meant nothing in the face of this wrongness, and the realization that he was the only one who had noticed this, and so he was the only one who could fix this, but he didn't know how.

He ended up going to Detective Yagami who was surprised to see him, and surprisingly understanding when Kuroko explained what he'd found out, but in the end, as helpless as Kuroko was.

"I agree, something strange is afoot," said Yagami after looking over the file of newspaper clippings Kuroko had comprised. "But I don't know what this is either. There's not enough to connect the victims for me to even make any guesses."

"But you agree something is wrong?" asked Kuroko. "You'll try to find out what?"

"I will."

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><p>The loss to Touo was a crippling blow to all of Seirin's moral. The third serial suicide was the icing on the cake to Kuroko. Even stopping another pick pocketing, with Hyuuga's and Izuki's help couldn't make Kuroko feel any better. So he went back to Detective Yagami Light with an odd request.<p>

"You want to see the next crime scene?" Light asked with only a slight amount of incredulity in his voice.

"Yes," said Kuroko. "I want to see it with my own eyes. I can only notice so much when all I have to go on are newspaper articles."

"I take it you saw the press conference I gave?" asked Light. "So you know I've taken over the cases."

"Yes."

"Even so, this will be an extremely unusual situation. Civilians aren't supposed to be allowed on crime scenes. Let alone children."

Kuroko started to protest that he wasn't a child. Light cut him off.

"However, when said child has more awareness and potential as a detective than any real detective I know, save for myself, I acknowledge that the situation changes." Light smiled. "When the rules that are meant to protect people impede the ones who can protect them from doing their jobs, I think that they can be bent. Don't you, Kuroko-kun?"

"I think that people should do what's right," Kuroko answered.

Light smiled. "Give me your cell phone's number. If I can, I'll call you when we find the next scene."

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><p>Kagami glanced sharply at his friend as Kuroko's cell phone began ringing. He'd only barely known Kuroko even had a cell phone and had never heard it ring before. Kuroko himself seemed surprised, but when he looked at the screen and saw who was calling, his expression changed to his crimebusting face. Kagami felt his adrenaline spike despite his misery of not being able to participate during practice, and of knowing that Seirin had been eliminated from Interhigh, even though they had one more match tomorrow.<p>

"What's wrong?" he demanded.

Kuroko motioned for him to wait, then answered his phone. He kept the conversation brief, only agreeing to something before hanging up and standing. "I'm going to a crime scene. I'll see you tomorrow Kagami-kun."

"Wait. You're going where?" demanded Kagami.

"To a crime scene. Detective Yagami agreed to let me take a look at it."

Kagami gawked at him. "You're helping the police with investigations now?"

"This is my first one. I requested it and Detective Yagami agreed," said Kuroko.

"I'm coming with you," said Kagami.

"But –"

"I don't care if they don't let me go in with you, I'm still going to be there," said Kagami.

Kuroko looked at him uncomprehending. "Why?"

Because I just know you're going to get in trouble if I'm not there with you," said Kagami. "You'll do something stupid, like confront a freaking murder suspect alone, unarmed, the same way you confront wannabe gangsters and convenience store robbers with guns."

"Fake guns. And there will be plenty of police officers there at the scene," said Kuroko.

"If it's you, I doubt that will make any difference. You'll find trouble."

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><p>To Kagami's surprise, he was let into the crime scene without any mishaps. Slightly later, he found out that was because people had assumed he was Kuroko, and had completely overlooked Kuroko himself. Detective Yagami, or Light, as he'd asked them to call him, seemed amused by that, and didn't mind his presence, so Kagami stood back and tried not to look at the dead body on the floor. Not that he could help that much if he wanted to keep an eye on Kuroko. The little phantom knelt beside the corpse like he wasn't phased by it in the least, checking under the dead woman's collar, examining her jewelry and umbrella, studying her fingernails, then looking around the room.<p>

"Where's her case?" he asked finally.

"Case?"

"Her suitcase," said Kuroko.

"She didn't have one," said Light.

"What?" Kuroko looked like he didn't believe him.

"She didn't have a suitcase."

Kuroko frowned and took out his phone. He started tapping madly on it, and Kagami had no idea what he was doing. "She had to have a suitcase."

"Why?" Kagami had to ask.

"Because of the mud splatters on the back of her calves," said Kuroko. "Look at the pattern."

"I'd rather not," said Kagami.

"You only get that pattern from rolling a suitcase behind you. A small one by the looks of this splatter. So where's her case? It must be here," said Kuroko, looking up from his phone and looking around the room again, like he might have missed it, or like it might appear out of nowhere.

"Maybe she took it home," suggested Detective Matsuda, Light's less intelligent partner.

"No. She didn't take it home or leave it at a motel." Kuroko hurried out of the room and into the hall. "Excuse me! Did anyone see a pink suitcase? Anyone?"

"Kuroko-kun," said Light. "What do –"

"Why do you think her suitcase is going to be pink?" Matsuda cut him off with the clearly more important question.

Kuroko was already halfway down the stairs. "Isn't it obvious, Detective Matsuda?"

"Why would it be obvious?"

"Pink coat. Pink heels. Pink nail polish, pink lipstick. All the same alarming color of pink. The suitcase will be the same. I'm going to go find it."

"What? Kuroko!" Kagami shouted, but Kuroko was already gone.

"Well, that wasn't quite what I expected," Light admitted.

Kagami tried to hurry after Kuroko, but his injured legs slowed him down, and Kuroko had too big of a head start. Not to mention Kuroko had that uncanny knack for disappearing even when he was in plain sight. By the time Kagami made it to the door, Kuroko had completely vanished.

He took out his phone and debated calling someone. He wasn't sure really who to call, or what to say to them. "Hey, Midorima, Kuroko's going to visit crime scenes now. Crime scenes with actual dead bodies in them. Great job getting him addicted to stopping crimes back in Teiko." Well, that would be interesting, but probably not worth the migraine he'd get from it. Calling Kise was out because he was far too annoying, and Aomine was way too much of a dick. Coach and Captain were going to kill him for losing Kuroko . . . but he decided he'd better face that music sooner than later.

He did try calling Kuroko, but the little brat didn't answer, which just figured. Kagami did have some comfort from the fact that Kuroko was only looking for a suitcase right now. Not the actual murderer. If there was a murderer. These serial suicides weirded him out and he wasn't afraid to admit it.

* * *

><p>Right as he got home, Kagami got a text from Kuroko.<p>

_221 B Byakku Street. Come at once if convenient._

That was Kuroko's home address, Kagami was pretty sure. He'd never been to Kuroko's flat, but he had a general idea where it must be, since he and Kuroko lived pretty close to each other.

Before Kagami could send a text back calling Kuroko an idiot, another text arrived.

_If inconvenient, please come anyway._

"You little . . ."

_Could be dangerous._ Was the third and final text, which prompted Kagami to run back up to his apartment and get a certain souvieneer he'd brought back from America.

I'm coming, idiot. Stay alive until I get there! Kagami texted back. He ran all the way to Byakku street, as fast as his aching legs would allow. Coach was going to kill him when she got a look at his muscles tomorrow, he was sure, but he could live with that. If something happened to Kuroko, not so much.

But, and Kagami wasn't sure whether to be relieved or annoyed when he found this out, Kuroko turned out to be perfectly fine when he arrived. He was seated cross-legged on the floor, staring at an extremely ugly little pink suit case, the contents of which, he's spread out around himself.

"What are you doing?" demanded Kagami.

"What?"

"I asked what are you doing?"

"Thinking," said Kuroko.

Kagami looked at the case then back at Kuroko. "Did you really find that pink woman's suitcase?"

"Yes. It was in a dumpster, only half a block away. The killer didn't make it too far before realizing it was still in his car."

"Killer?" asked Kagami.

"Isn't it obvious?" Kuroko looked at Kagami like he expected an answer and Kagami realized this was one of those times when Kuroko couldn't tell whether or not other people saw things the same way he did. He wasn't trying to be arrogant. But that didn't make it any less annoying.

"There's nothing obvious about this at all."

"Oh. Sorry.' Kuroko paused then asked, "Do you want me to explain it?"

"Yes! Start with why you ran out on Light like that!"

"I told him, to find the suitcase." Kuroko looked a bit bewildered.

"Why?"

"Because I knew the killer wouldn't make it very far before realizing he still had it. It's a bit of an eyesore. It's also extremely conspicuous, so I knew he'd want to get rid of it first chance he could. I searched the dumpsters and trash bins around the building where the crime scene was. It took me less than half an hour to find it," said Kuroko.

"Shouldn't you, I don't know, turn it over to the police?"

"I will. But I found it. I wanted the first look at the woman's phone."

"What phone?" asked Kagami.

"That's what I've been wondering. Oh, that reminds me, I need you to send a text for me."

"What? You can't use your own phone to send it?" asked Kagami.

"No. See the phone number on the tag here?" asked Kuroko. "Please send this text there –"

"Hang on," said Kagami, hurrying to get his phone on and enter the number he needed to text too. "Alright, go ahead."

"Text this exactly, please. 'What happened at Hamizan Gardens? I must have blacked out. Maji Burger on Byakku Street. Please come.'"

Kagami looked at his shadow in alarm. "You blacked out?"

"No."

"But you just said –"

"I lied. I know lying is bad, but we're only lying to a murderer, so it's alright."

Kagami had just sent the text as Kuroko finished saying this. "What? Do you mean – Kuroko, did I just text a murderer?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

Kagami's phone started ringing.

"Don't answer that," Kuroko said quickly.

"Kuroko, what the hell is going on?" demanded Kagami.

Kuroko stood up. "I'll explain on the way."

* * *

><p>It turned out that when he slowed down and explained things for other people Kuroko could do a good job at it. He explained to Kagami how he'd figured the murdered woman must have a phone because she didn't have a laptop. He'd deduced that she had to have brought one or the other on this trip with her, because she was a serial adulterer, something he'd realized from the fact that all of her jewelry was clean except for her wedding ring, which was only polished on the inside, meaning she regularly removed it. His explanation for how he knew she was out of town was kind of convoluted and involved weather reports and the fact that the woman's umbrella was dry, but her coat was wet. Kagami didn't care too much about that so he zoned out until Kuroko got back to things that he could understand better, like how he guessed that the killer must still have the phone because it wasn't in the suitcase, or on the dead woman, and so likely, if the woman knew she was going to her death, she'd planted it somewhere in the killer's car, hoping it would lead the police to her murderer.<p>

"You really think he's going to be dumb enough to show up at Maji Burger?" asked Kagami as they made their way there.

"No. I think he's genius enough to."

Kagami looked sideways at him. Then he remembered how the Generation of Miracles were all considered geniuses. And he decided that he and Kuroko were using different definitions of the word genius. The one Kuroko used obviously included being messed up in the head.

They went into Maji Burger, got their usual order, and sat down at their usual table.

"Don't stare out the window," Kuroko admonished when Kagami started to do just that.

"You're staring out the window," said Kagami, annoyed.

"But the killer won't see me staring out the window."

Kagami rolled his eyes. "Probably true. But how are you going to know him when you see him? You don't know who he is."

"No. But I know what he is."

"What?" asked Kagami.

"I see the connection now," said Kuroko. "I was blind not to before. Who else could abduct four unrelated people out of public places, with no struggle? If there'd been any connections between them other than their deaths, I would have thought that they all knew their murderer, but there was no overlap. Detective Yagami checked very carefully. It was so obvious. I feel like a fool."

"If you're a fool, I don't even want to think about what the rest of us are," said Kagami. "What are you talking about? Who is this guy?"

"Whose car do you get into without a second thought?" asked Kuroko. "Whose car does anyone get into without a second thought?"

"Their mom or dad's?"

"No," said Kuroko, and his voice actually had a little bit of frustration. "You don't have to pretend you haven't figured it out yet to make me feel better."

Kagami glared at him. "Who's pretending? God, you're annoying."

He went to take a drink of his soda, but found that it was empty. "I'm getting a refill. You, just . . . stay here and try not to be so annoying."

He was only gone for a minute. A freaking minute. No more than that. There wasn't even a line at the counter. It was more like thirty or forty seconds. But when he got back, Kuroko was gone.

Kagami stared at Kuroko's seat, expecting Kuroko to suddenly pop out of nowhere, like he did so often. But after several seconds, he realized Kuroko really was no longer there.

"Kuroko? Where –"

Kagami looked out the window just in time to see Kuroko slump to the ground, his back against a taxicab.

"What the –"

Kuroko was still slightly conscious. He tried to crawl away, but suddenly the cab driver was there, lifting him up and shoving him into the backseat.

"HEY!"

Kagami tore out of the restaurant, oblivious to the scene he'd made. His only thought was getting to his friend before it was too late.

The cab driver was already back in his seat when Kagami got outside. He was already pulling away. Desperately, Kagami ran after the car, ignoring the pain in his shins. He didn't care about slowing down his recovery, or what Coach was going to say when she saw him. He only cared about getting his shadow back. So he could kill Kuroko himself for pulling this crap!

But it was useless. He wasn't fast enough. Even uninjured, he wouldn't have been fast enough. The taxi disappeared into the Tokyo traffic, leaving nothing behind to show it had ever been there, spiriting his shadow away.

* * *

><p>"Wakey, wakey."<p>

Kuroko opened his eyes slowly and tried to take stock of his surroundings. Everything was slow, like he was in mud. Or some viscous liquid. But why? And who was this funny looking guy who –

Oh.

Kuroko remembered now. Confronting the cab driver turned serial killer. Alone. That had not been the best play he'd ever made. If he lived through this, Kagami was going to kill him.

"I hope you don't mind. I got your address off your student handbook," said the killer/cab driver. "Kuroko Tetsuya."

"This is my apartment," said Kuroko looking around.

"I figured, why not? I knew no one would be here. You wear your loneliness like a suit of armor. I knew you had no parents worth speaking of." The cabbie peered at him from behind a pair of ugly little glasses and leered. "So it's just you and me here."

Kuroko tried to stand. He ended up face planting on the floor.

"Careful," the cabbie said. "The drugs are still in your system."

"What did you give me?" asked Kuroko, remembering the syringe in his arm and the panic he'd felt as the world started to go dark.

"Just a little something to knock you out for a bit. You'll be dizzy for awhile if you try to walk, but in a minute, seated, you'll be able to think fine," the cabbie said. "Which is good. I want you on your best game."

"Game?" Absurdly, Kuroko thought he was talking about basketball for a minute. He couldn't think of any other game.

"Yes. A game between just you and me," said the cabbie.

"And . . . if I don't want to play?" asked Kuroko.

"You already are playing," said the cabbie. "Thinking you're so smart, trying to hunt me down."

"That's not a game," said Kuroko, trying to crawl . . . somewhere. He didn't know where yet. "That was the right thing to do."

The cabbie hauled him off the floor and into a chair at the table.

"The right thing? Is that supposed to be a joke?"

"No. I have no sense of humor." Kuroko flinched when the cabbie patted his face. "Stop."

"Do you think you can make me?" the cabbie asked. Kuroko tried in vane to bat his hand away. "You're weak as a kitten. I could do anything I wanted to you right now, you know. Anything at all."

He gave Kuroko a moment to let the implication sink in. Kuroko forced himself to show no emotion or signs of fear when it did.

"But don't worry," the cabbie said at last. "I'm only going to kill you. As long as you play nice. If you try anything funny, like screaming or shouting, well, I promise it won't go well for you."

Kuroko stared at him blankly.

"Now. Onto the game." The cabbie sat down in the chair opposite him and took out two clear glass bottles. In each one were several white pills with brown speckles on them. The cabbie put both bottles down on the table. "So, you want to know how I make them take the poison?"

He waited for Kuroko to say something. Kuroko just stared at him.

"Well," he said at last. "Here's how. See, there's a good bottle, and a bad bottle. In one bottle, there's the poison. In the other, placebo. Choose the good pill and you live. Choose the bad one and you die. And whichever one you don't take, I do."

"And you know which is which," Kuroko said.

"Of course I know," said the cabbie.

"But I don't."

The cabbie smirked. "It wouldn't be a game if you knew. See, you get to choose one. And if you choose right, you live."

Anger washed over Kuroko, giving him a bit more strength to fight against the drugs in his system. "That's not a game. It's chance."

"Not really," laughed the cabbie. "I've played four times. Yet I'm still alive. It's not chance, Kuroko-chan. It's chess."

The condescending honorific made Kuroko want to hit this man, more than the implicit threat on his life did.

"It's a game of chess with one move, and one survivor," the cabbie said. "And this right here . . . this is the move."

Then he picked up the bottle on his right and moved it across the table so that it was within easy reach for Kuroko.

"Did I just give you the placebo or the poison?" he asked. "You can choose either one."

Kuroko stared at the pills on the table, then lifted his gaze to the cabbie. "So that's how you've been doing it? That's how you killed all of them? You gave them a choice?"

"You've got to admit," the cabbie drawled. "For a serial killer, I'm pretty nice. Anyways, time's up. It's time for you to choose."

"And then?" asked Kuroko.

"And then," the cabbie said, "together we take our medicine."

And he smacked his lips together. "Let's play."

Kuroko gritted his teeth as he stared at the cabbie. This man . . . he didn't deserve to be called a man. This man was wrong in the worst kind of way. Kuroko had started down this path because he hadn't agreed with what the Generation of Miracles had done, but they would never do something so vile as this.

"Play what?" he demanded. "It's a fifty-fifty chance!"

"You're not playing the odds, Kuroko-chan," said the cabbie. "You're playing against me. Did I give you the good pill or the bad one? Is it a bluff? Or a double bluff? Or even a triple bluff? Or maybe even a quadruple bluff –"

"Stop screwing around! It's still chance!" said Kuroko angrily.

"I've beat four people in a row! It's not chance."

"Then it's luck!"

"No, it's genius!" said the cabbie. "It's all about how people think. And I know how they think. And how they think I think. I can see it all, like a map in my head. Everyone's so stupid. Especially you."

Kuroko glared. Then he swallowed his anger. "You chose people who weren't from Tokyo, or at least not the parts where you found them. Looking for people who didn't know where they were, so they wouldn't know you were taking them to the wrong places. You risked your life four times . . . to kill strangers. Oh. I see."

"See what?" the cabbie asked.

"You're dying."

The cabbie twitched in shock.

"And you don't have long," Kuroko realized.

"Aneurysm," the cabbie said, a dark look replacing his shocked one. He tapped the side of his skull. "Right here. Any breath could be my last."

"And you think that's an excuse for murdering four people?" demanded Kuroko.

"I've outlived four people," spat the cabbie.

"But you're not going to outlive five," said Kuroko.

"Oh no?"

"No," said Kuroko. "I'm not going to play your disgusting game."

"Then I'll choose for you and shove it down your throat."

"I'll fight back," said Kuroko.

"You're weak as a kitten from that shot I gave you."

"It doesn't matter. I never give up without a fight. Even with sedatives in my system, I'm a relatively healthy teenage athlete. You're an old man with an aneurysm. Are those odds that you want to play?"

"Well," said the cabbie, reaching into his jacket, "there's always this."

With that, he pulled out a gun.

Kuroko looked at it. "Is that supposed to scare me?"

"It would if you had a lick of sense, boy."

"Then go ahead," said Kuroko. "Shoot me."

The cabbie aimed the gun at him and pulled the trigger. A small flame appeared out of the barrel of the gun, or rather, the cigarette lighter that had been made to look like a gun.

"I've had enough of this," said Kuroko. He stood, very carefully, and took it as a good sign that he managed to keep his balance. "I'm calling the police."

"Seems I underestimated you, Kuroko-chan. Looks like you might be a genius yourself."

"I'm not," said Kuroko. "I just notice things."

"I saw that glare you gave me when I called you stupid. You know you're smart. You're just too modest to say so out loud. Well, is it really going to sit alright with you?"

"What?"

"Never knowing if you could have beaten me?" asked the cabbie. "Will you be alright never knowing if you were really smarter than me or not?"

"I am smarter than you. I'm smart enough to know nothing good comes of hurting other people. You're not."

"Well, just out of curiosity, which one would you have picked?" asked the cabbie. "Come on. Humor me. If you do, I promise I'll sit here like a good boy and let the police come arrest me."

Kuroko stared at him, surprised . . . because everything he could read about whether a person was lying or not said that he was telling the truth now.

So, wordlessly, Kuroko reached across the table and lifted the bottle that the cabbie had left closer to himself.

"Oh, interesting," said the cabbie. He reached for the other bottle and took a pill out of it. "Want to see if you were right?"

"No."

"You're lying, Kuroko-chan," said the cabbie. "Remember, I know how people think. You want to try it out. You want to prove that you were right. So, how about it?"

"No," said Kuroko.

"What's wrong? Worried you're stupid after all?"

"I'm not stupid," said Kuroko.

"Then prove it."

There were a million reasons not to, but somehow, Kuroko found his hands twisting off the bottle cap, and removing one pill from the bottle.

He held up the pill to his eye level, inspecting it, still not sure. But the cabbie's eyes were lit up like he'd already won. And Kuroko's hands were shaking slightly for reasons he didn't understand. He knew this was a bad idea. He knew that this was stupid. But . . .

"Shall we?" asked the cabbie.

Kuroko began to lower his hand.

BANG!

The pill slipped out of Kuroko's fingers as the cabbie fell onto the table, then off it, onto the ground. Kuroko gawked down at the bullet hole in his back, then stared at the matching bullet hole in his window, for once not bothering to guard his expression. Had anyone been watching, his surprise would have been plain for them to see.

* * *

><p>"What the hell were you thinking, Kuroko? Pulling shit like that! I oughta kill you myself!" shouted Kagami.<p>

"Where is it?" Kuroko asked urgently, keeping his voice low.

"What?"

"You know what," said Kuroko. He dropped his voice to a whisper. "What did you do with the gun?"

A little bit of Kagami's anger was replaced with surprise, but then he answered, also in a low voice, "Threw it in the river."

"We need to get the powder burns off your hands, just in case. I don't think Detective Yagami will look your way when trying to find a suspect, but there's no point in taking chances."

"Don't talk to me about taking chances," hissed Kagami. "Not after all this shit you pulled! I thought we came to an understanding about you approaching suspects alone! And then . . . tell me you weren't really going to swallow that pill!"

"I wasn't going to."

"You were!"

"I wasn't."

"I saw that look on your face, you idiot! You were definitely going to!"

Kuroko looked at the ground. "I don't know if I was going to or not."

Kagami gave him a shake. "Idiot."

"I'm sorry."

"You should be. Never do that again, Kuroko! Your life is worth too much to waste in a pissing contest with some self proclaimed genius!"

"But I did choose the right one."

"You don't know that," growled Kagami. "Matsuda told me the pills got mixed up when the cabbie fell on the table."

"I know. I chose the right one."

"You don't know! Now shut up, or I'm going to hit you!"

They were walking. Kuroko wasn't sure where. Until he took a second to think about it. Figuring out how other people thought suddenly seemed to be getting easier. "We're going to your apartment."

"Yeah. You can't sleep at a crime scene."

"Thank you, Kagami-kun . . . Are you alright?"

"Me?" Kagami snorted. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"You did just kill a man," said Kuroko softly.

Kagami made a disgusted noise. "I'm not going to lose any sleep over that."

"Kagami-kun."

"I grew up in a state with capital punishment. I support it. And if it was a choice between him and you, that's no choice at all. The only thing that I'm going to lose sleep over is how close you came to getting your idiot self killed," growled Kagami.

"I'm sorry."

"Not as sorry as you're going to be. Coach, Captain, and the rest of the team are on their way to my place as we speak. Coach said something about the Boston Crab hold when I filled her in on everything that happened."

Kuroko paled.

But despite the impending threat of his coach, and the pain he knew he was going to go through, he couldn't help but feel it was overshadowed by another kind of dread.

That thrill he'd felt holding that pill tonight scared him. The thrill of all the danger he'd been in, to be honest. He'd never felt more alive than when he was playing a game with his life as the stakes.

Maybe it was because for the first time in a long time, all the guilt for his past inaction had been pushed away. Or maybe it was something else. Some deep seated addiction to danger that he'd never known he had before, since he'd never been in real danger before. But whatever it was, he already knew he'd be feeling it again.

He had no intentions of stopping this thing he'd started.

Kuroko just hoped Kagami-kun would be there next time too, to save him from himself.

* * *

><p>Please review!<p> 


	4. Extra Scenes For A Study In Shadows

A Study In Shadows: Extra Scenes

Summary: By request, 2 scenes that weren't detailed on in A Study In Shadows, and 1 scene with a little more aftermath.

* * *

><p><em>1: Kuroko getting drugged<em>

It happened only seconds after Kagami stepped away. The cab pulled up. The empty cab. Its driver parked the taxi against the curb. Then he put on his Out of Service light.

Got you, thought Kuroko, already halfway to the door.

The summer heat hit him as soon as he stepped outside. And with it, a realization. Kagami-kun was not going to be happy. What Kuroko was doing right now, that was going against everything Kagami had yelled at him about since . . . since Kuroko started speaking out against the things he thought were wrong.

And if Kagami had gotten so mad at him just for confronting street punks and a convenience store robber with a fake gun, he would be beyond furious at Kuroko for trying to have a face to face with a serial killer.

That almost made Kuroko turn back. Kagami was important to him. He didn't want to deliberately make him angry.

But Kuroko's feet kept moving forward, and he didn't quite know why. Maybe it was because he loathed this cabbie much more than he feared Kagami's anger. He knew Kagami would never hurt him. But this cabbie was a murderer who'd killed four people, and gotten away with it. Kuroko couldn't let that be.

Predictably, the cabbie didn't even notice Kuroko, not even when Kuroko was standing right outside his window. It was only when Kuroko rapped on the glass that the cabbie saw he was there. He jumped, then looked sharply at Kuroko. His expression wasn't like a normal person who had been startled by Kuroko. He was much more on edge. Confirming what Kuroko had already known. This man was the murderer he was looking for. He'd been watching out for the pink woman, wondering if somehow she'd survived his poison.

"I'm not in service," said the cabbie, after rolling his window down.

Kuroko stared past him, into the car, looking for the object he knew must be there. He noticed it almost immediately. Its color was an eyesore and made it stand out.

Kuroko stepped back, took out his own cell phone and dialed the number on the pink lady's luggage tag. Inside the cab her pink phone began to ring. He watched as the cabbie looked around sharply, no doubt trying to see the pink lady. Then, almost hesitantly, he answered the call.

"How do you make them take the poison?" asked Kuroko.

The cabbie's mouth opened and closed in disbelief before he asked, in a voice that sounded _scared,_ "What?"

Anger flooded through Kuroko. Fury, rage, burning hate so intense it actually made him see red. What right did this monster have to sound scared after taking four lives, and devastating four families? It was like every bit of negative emotion Kuroko hadn't been able to fully feel or express for the Generation of Miracles, back when they were hurting people, even his other friends, was suddenly manifesting now, because the next thing Kuroko knew, he had reached through the open window of the cab and grabbed the driver's collar.

"Stop screwing around. I said how do you make them take the poison?" demanded Kuroko. He didn't shout it. But his tone was more vicious than any he'd ever used.

"Whoa! Who are you?" asked the cabbie. He almost sounded like he was panicking. Good.

"I'm a shadow," Kuroko responded.

The cabbie snorted. "Do you like drugs, little shadow?"

The question threw Kuroko. "What?"

Then it hit him, like a sledgehammer. His vision blurred and started going dark. His knees buckled and Kuroko found himself on the ground. A slight sting came from the syringe in his arm. His fall had jostled it.

This is not good, Kuroko realized. This was one of the outcomes Kagami-kun must have been afraid of.

Kagami-kun . . .

Kuroko looked up as he tried to drunkenly crawl away. Through the window of Maji Burger, to his and Kagami's usual table. Kagami was staring out in horror. His drink cup was falling from his hand to the floor and he was tearing out of the restaurant.

Hands grabbed Kuroko and pulled him off the sidewalk. He tried to struggle but all his limbs were too heavy and darkness was falling too fast. Kuroko was unable to stop the cab driver from shoving him into the back seat and slamming the door behind him.

But Kuroko wasn't afraid.

Kagami-kun was coming for him.

* * *

><p><em>2: Kagami shooting the cabbie<em>

Shit.

How did it come to this? Kagami wondered as he watched in horror as Kuroko raised the pill, the poison, to his eye level and stared at it with an expression Kagami had never seen before.

That expression scared him, because it was like the one he wore on the basketball court, but completely different at the very same time. When Kuroko was on the court, he had an air of stability around him. Like he was a pillar supporting the team, despite his small stature and unorthodox ways. But there was no stability about him now. And this expression was different, like Kuroko needed an anchor, because he was slipping out of control.

How did it come to this? Who had messed Kuroko up so badly that he did this kind of thing?

Kagami had his suspicions. Especially since this seemed to be a new thing. Kise had been as shocked as Kagami when Kuroko confronted those punks on the streetball court. So that probably meant Kuroko hadn't always done things like this.

Things like throwing himself headfirst into danger, all in the name of doing what he thought was right.

It was like someone had made him think looking the other way was an unforgivable sin.

And who did Kuroko have in his life who could put a thought like that in his head?

Gee I wonder.

Kagami gripped his gun, a souvineer smuggled home from America, with both hands, for better control. He needed as much stability as he could get for this shot. It was a hard shot. His hands couldn't shake at all it he wanted to make it.

A small part of this was his fault.

He'd managed to chase down the cab on foot, somehow. Mostly. He lost it near the end. But by then he was so close to Kuroko's apartment that he just had a feeling. It could have been a coincidence that the cabbie had taken a route so close to Kuroko's place. But Kagami was desperate and grasping at straws. A minute later, when he'd arrived and saw that cab there, he bolted right up the stairs to Kuroko's apartment. Only to realize that he was in the wrong freaking building of the apartment complex.

Which was how he found himself staring at his partner, through two windows with a small courtyard between them.

Kuroko started to lower the pill to his mouth and Kagami's heart rate started picking up, like it would in a game as he lined up his shot.

And pulled the trigger.

BANG!

A hole appeared in the cabbie's chest and Kagami only had a second to see it before the dead man's body was falling. And Kagami saw with relief that the pill had fallen out of Kuroko's hand too, and he'd jumped back and was wearing an expression for once. Unadulterated shock.

The little bastard didn't even look scared. Just surprised.

"Idiot," whispered Kagami, lowering his gun and hurrying away from the window. He was satisfied that Kuroko was safe. Whatever threat the cabbie had been using to make Kuroko take the poison was gone since the cabbie himself was gone. And maybe Kagami should have felt bad about how he'd just killed the bastard. But oddly, he didn't.

Maybe guilt would come later.

Probably not. It had never come that time in America, when Kagami broke the arm of a bully who'd beaten up and terrorized several of his classmates. Yes, killing someone was a whole lot more extreme, but Kagami didn't care. If there was a choice between his shadow and that low life piece of shit, there was no choice at all. There was only Kuroko.

* * *

><p><em>3: Seihou thanking Kuroko<em>

"Kuroko Tetsuya! Hey, Kuroko Tetsuya!"

Kuroko turned at the sound of his name. It was rare for anyone to call out to him at all, and even rarer for him not to recognize the voice.

Were he anyone else, he would have probably showed a surprised expression at the sight before him. The regulars of Seihou must have been camping out in front of Seirin waiting for him, because they were all there. Tsugawa, in the lead, was holding a newspaper and suddenly waving it in his face.

"Kuroko Tetsuya! Explain this for us, will you?"

Kuroko took it and looked at it uncomprehendingly. The paper had been rearranged so that the sports section was at the front . . . but he didn't see anything relevant about any of the articles.

"You're upset about our elimination from Interhigh," he deduced from the available information.

"What? No, I'm talking about – oh. Sorry, wrong page," said Tsugawa, who quickly rearranged the paper. "I was reading the sports section while we waited and . . . ah, here. This. Explain it. Now, please!"

"Tsugawa, be polite," their captain ordered, clamping a hand on Tsugawa's bald head.

Kuroko looked at the newspaper's front story and saw that it wasn't today's newspaper. It was the one that had come out last Saturday morning. Kuroko had picked up a copy just to see what it said, the evening of the day it came out, after Seirin had lost its third match in the Interhigh bracket they'd been in, and after they'd finally gotten away from the police who had a million and one questions about the kidnapping they'd stopped. But that was another story. Another halted crime.

"I'm sorry, but what did you want me to explain?" asked Kuroko.

"How about what you're doing in the picture on the front page?" said Tsugawa impatiently.

"You saw that?" Again, Kuroko was surprised. Detective Yagami was front and center in that picture. Kuroko was barely visible amongst the police cars with their bright blue lights, and all the officers on the scene. Just a shadow at the edge of the photo, sitting on the stoop of the ambulance, waiting for the officers present to give up on getting his parents on the phone and let him leave already.

"I told you I'd remember you, didn't I?" demanded Tsugawa. "Obviously I was going to see this article! It was about the bastard who killed my sempai getting caught!"

"More or less," said Kuroko.

"What?"

"Well," said Kuroko, "he wasn't actually caught."

"Caught, killed, I don't care as long as he was made to pay for it," growled Tsugawa. "But that doesn't explain why you're in the picture? Like I said, I told you I'd remember you! And obviously I was going to see that article! So when I saw you in the picture, I recognized you! Why were you there that night? What happened?"

"What Tsugawa is trying to ask," said their captain, Iwamura, "Is we'd like to know if you're the unnamed teenage civilian mentioned in the article. The one who was instrumental to that bastard being stopped."

It occurred to Kuroko that maybe he should lie. He was already getting far too much attention for . . . well, everything. Detective Yagami had promised not to give his name to the press, so that was something. But a lot of people knew what Kuroko was getting up to anyway. It had been very unfortunate that Touo had been there when Seirin stopped that bastard who was kidnapping that little girl. They'd learned far more than Kuroko would have liked for them to learn. He'd have preferred to limit the number of people who knew about his . . . extracurricular activities just to Seirin, and to leave their basketball rivals and his ex-teammates from the Generation of Miracles out of it completely.

But on the other hand, it had been one of Seihou's benchwarmers who'd been one of the serial killer's victims. It was more than understandable that they wanted to know everything about what happened. Had it been someone from Seirin who'd been murdered, or even someone from his old team at Teikou, Kuroko would have torn the world apart to find the truth.

"I was the one who caught him," said Kuroko, not sure if they would believe him, but deciding to be honest anyway. "More or less. He was in my apartment when he was killed."

Tsugawa laughed. Happily. Then he slung an arm around Kuroko. "I knew it!"

Kuroko shifted uncomfortably at the physical contact. He barely knew Tsugawa. But he guessed it wasn't so bad. If Tsugawa liked you, he seemed like he could be a good friend.

"I wasn't the one who killed him."

"Yeah. We figured that since you're not in jail," said Kasuga.

"And since you don't really seem like the kind of person to really try to kill someone," said Tsugawa, dragging him down the path.

Kuroko stumbled, but not because of Tsugawa. Without Tsugawa, he probably would have fallen. No, he stumbled because he just realized something.

In a matter of speaking, he had tried to kill someone. If Kagami hadn't shot the cabbie before Kuroko swallowed one of the pills, then the cabbie would have swallowed the other. And Kuroko was 100 percent convinced that that the pill in his own hand had been the placebo. So . . . that left the poisoned pill in the cabbie's hand. Taking the placebo meant poisoning the cabbie. And Kuroko had been right on the verge of doing just that.

Until right then, Kuroko hadn't realized that he had actually tried, and nearly succeeded, in killing someone.

"Come on. We're taking you to dinner."

Kuroko snapped back to the present. "What? Why?"

"Why do you think? Because you helped stop the guy who killed our teammate," said Kasuga, reaching down to ruffle Kuroko's hair, like he was a lot more familiar with Kuroko than he or any of Seihou actually was.

"But –"

"My dad owns a sushi restaurant," said Tsugawa, overruling Kuroko's protests. "It's our team's usual hangout. Come with us, Kuroko Tetsuya!"

"But –"

"Come with us! Come with us!"

Tsugawa's chanting strongly reminded Kuroko of Kise, and how sometimes it was easier just to give in and let him have his way than to keep resisting.

"Alright."

"Huh? Seriously?" Tsugawa grinned. "Alright! I thought I'd have to pester you for another five minutes, at least."

Kuroko had too much to think about right now to argue at the same time. Namely, he had to think about how he felt, realizing that he'd almost murdered someone.

* * *

><p>Thank you for all the reviews and messages so far! They're all appreciated!<p>

I will be trying to write some original cases for Kuroko and Kagami to solve (since that's been requested alot) instead of just rehashing the BBC Sherlock's plots. I'll be borrowing some elements from the BBC Sherlock, but not as closely as I did for last chapter again. Fair warning: I've never really written a mystery before. The closest I've come is the first half of my fic "How Does It Feel." But I will be trying to write some original cases. I haven't thought of many ideas for them yet, but I'm working on it. Thank you for all your support so far!


	5. Mini Chapter

These are a couple little pieces I wrote that didn't really fit anywhere else. A longer chapter is on the way!

* * *

><p><strong>Patches<strong>

Kagami's eyes narrowed into a glare as they fell on Kuroko's arm. "Kuroko? What is that?"

"What is what?" asked Kuroko.

"You know what," said Kagami. He grabbed Kuroko's arm and pointed at the bandage-like patch on the inside of his elbow. "What is that?"

"It's a nicotine patch, Kagami-kun," said Kuroko.

"I know it's a nicotine patch!" shouted Kagami. "Why the hell are you wearing one? You don't even smoke!"

Kuroko just stared at him.

Kagami's jaw dropped and he spluttered. "Do you?"

"Of course not, Kagami-kun. I'm an athlete."

Kagami breathed a mental sigh of relief. But he didn't let it show. "Then why the hell are you wearing a nicotine patch?"

"Because Light-senpai gave me five of Detective Matsuda's cold case files that he doesn't have time to go back and solve," said Kuroko.

"What does that have to do with you wearing a smoker's patch?" Kagami demanded.

"I'm getting to that," said Kuroko patiently. "I solved four of them last night. But the fifth one has me stumped. So I thought that it might be a good idea to try boosting my brain power with some relatively harmless stimulants."

Kagami grabbed the patch and ripped it off his arm.

"Ow." Kuroko stared at him.

"Are you stupid? Are you really that stupid? Nicotine is not harmless, Kuroko!"

"I said relatively harmless."

"You're an idiot!" Kagami shouted. "I know you know what cigarettes do to people!"

"Which is exactly why I'm not smoking to get the nicotine," said Kuroko. "But a patch is different."

"Not different enough!" Kagami said. "You're not using nicotine patches! Do you understand me?"

Kuroko stared at him. If he was anyone else, he probably would have pulled a sullen expression.

"Do you?" Kagami asked, and gave him a rough shake.

"Yes."

Kagami tossed the nicotine patch into a nearby trashcan as they continued on their way home. "You know, for a genius, you're an idiot."

* * *

><p><strong>Eagle Eye vs. Blind Banker<strong>

"Soo . . . I still don't get it."

Kuroko looked from Izuki to Kagami. "Did I not explain it well? Did I miss something?"

"No," said Kagami. "Your explanation was pretty straightforward."

"You're going to give me one third of the ridiculously high number of yen written on that check Kagami's waving around, just for using my Eagle Eye and telling you which one of these desks would have a clear view of the graffiti on that painting?" asked Izuki to make sure he understood this right.

"And a share of the final payment," said Kuroko. "To be determined by how many people's help I need for this case. We'll all get an equal share of the final payment."

Izuki looked bemused. "You know I'll help you. I'd help you anyway. I can't take your money just for –"

"You can. You must," said Kuroko. "I insist."

"He does insist," said Kagami. "If I couldn't talk him out of giving me a share, you won't be able to either."

Izuki still felt a little bad. But he wasn't going to withhold his help from Kuroko. He could try to talk Kuroko out of giving him a ridiculously large sum of money later. When they weren't in an office surrounded by bankers and shareholders and other wealthy, important looking people. He switched his focus in his mind to an overhead view, and took into account the height of the desks and partitions, and within seconds, had Kuroko's answer. "There are two desks whose occupants would have a view of the painting. That one, and that one."

"Thank you, Izuki-senpai," said Kuroko. "That was very helpful."

"I'm not saying I'm not glad to help, but couldn't you have found that out on your own?" asked Izuki.

"I could have. But I would have had to run from desk to desk, and duck down, and stand up, and would have been very obnoxious and disturbed everyone's work," said Kuroko.

"I doubt they would have actually noticed you at all," Kagami pointed out with cruel bluntness.

Kuroko looked at him expressionlessly. Izumi imagined that was the Kuroko version of the stink eye.

"It would still have been rude of me," said Kuroko. "Please excuse me. I will now find out whose desks those are, and see if either of them have been in to work since the break in last night."

"How are you helping him with this?" asked Izuki as they watched him go.

"He says he wants me here in case he needs me to shoot someone."

"Oh. So that's what the basketball's for?"

* * *

><p><strong>Badge of Honor<strong>

"I have a plan," said Kuroko, in his most deadpan voice. The one Kagami knew either meant he was struggling to hide a large amount of anger, but not quite reaching levels of furious . . . or meant his plan was going to be horrible in some way or another.

"What?" he asked warily.

"You'll go over and introduce yourself as Detective Yagami Light –"

"That's, not going to work," said Kagami.

"It will."

"No, it won't," said Kagami. "For one thing, impersonating a police officer's a crime! At least I'm pretty sure it's a crime here in Japan. I know it is in America. For another, they're not going to believe me unless I show them some ID, and so –"

"Here."

Kuroko pressed something into Kagami's hand.

Kagami stared at it dumbfounded. "Kuroko . . . this . . ."

"I picked it from Detective Yagami's pocket."

"Kuroko!" Kagami shouted.

"Yes?"

"You – augh! You shouldn't do things like that! What's Light going to say when he finds out?" demanded Kagami.

Kuroko's eyes brightened. "I think he'll actually be proud of me. He's the one who taught me how to do it."

* * *

><p>I've been working on a much longer chapter that's almost done. An actual original mystery for Kuroko to solve. With guest appearances by Midorima and Takao. I've been writing it since I posted the last chapter of this fic and it's nearly broken my brain, lol. These are little scraps that sprang out of my mind while I was working on it, and I wanted to post them in the meantime. Please check back again in a few days for the next chapter.<p>

And as always, please review!


	6. The Adventure Of The Alley Abduction

The Adventure of the Alley Abduction

Summary: Kuroko finds himself on a hunt to save a woman who was kidnapped after he stumbles upon the site where she was abducted and notices signs that anyone else would have missed.

* * *

><p>Kuroko and Takao walked ahead as Kagami and Midorima hung back, walking slower because of their bickering. And they'd been bickering since they ran into each other in the convenience store, to Takao's amusement.<p>

"I'm so glad that Shin-chan is making friends," said Takao, even though Kuroko had seemed distracted all while they were in the convenience store. He looked at Kuroko when he didn't get a response, and was not surprised to see that Kuroko didn't seem to be paying any attention at all to him. Story of his life.

He was, however, surprised to see Kuroko wandering into the alley that they'd just started to walk past.

"Meh? What're you doing?" asked Takao as Kuroko held his hand near the wall, just short of touching it, his fingers spread apart at fairly wide intervals.

Kuroko gave him a brief glance, but that was the only acknowledgement he gave Takao. His eyes were odd, Takao noted. It was like he was only half there. No. Actually, it was like he was more there than anyone else. Like he was seeing things that no one else could see.

Takao knew how that was. But he didn't know what there was to be seen here. It was just a normal alley.

"Are you okay?" he asked, just to make sure, as Kuroko picked something up off the ground. Then he blinked as he saw what it was. It was a freaking fingernail. Painted a darkish red. Takao hoped to God it was a fake nail, and not a real one, but even then, Kuroko shouldn't just be walking around picking things like that up. "Put that down! It's probably diseased!"

And just _how_ did he get stuck playing the role of the responsible one?

"Kagami-kun."

The voice was unlike any Takao had heard Kuroko use. He didn't raise it from his usual soft tone, but it was chalk full of urgency.

Kagami stopped talking in mid-insult and came sprinting forward, Midorima completely forgotten. But Midorima didn't look too miffed. If anything, he looked a little worried, probably from the combination of that foreign tone Kuroko had used and the way Kagami had dropped out in the middle of their little bitching-fest to run to Kuroko's side.

"What is it? What do you need?" Kagami asked in an urgent tone of his own. Takao didn't miss how alert he'd suddenly gone, or the way his fists clenched, like he was ready for danger. "What the hell is that? Is that a human fingernail?"

"It's fake," said Kuroko, looking up at Kagami with darkened eyes. Then past him to where Takao and Midorima were starting to move toward them. "Please keep those two out of my crime scene, Kagami-kun."

Instantly, Kagami was blocking their path.

Takao took a step back and held up his hands in surrender. He didn't want to try to get past Kagami if there wasn't a referee standing by with a whistle. He had the feeling that without the threat of fouls hanging over his head, Kagami would be cracking open other peoples' heads if they wanted to get past him when he wanted to stop them. Especially if his shadow was the one giving the order to stop them.

"Crime scene?" asked Midorima. "Kuroko, what are you talking about?"

"Something bad happened here," said Kuroko. And now he had a little clutch purse in his hands, that he'd started going through. "A woman was abducted."

"Don't be ridiculous," Midorima said.

"How do you figure that?" Takao asked.

"Shut up and let him work," said Kagami angrily.

"You can't possibly believe what he just said," Midorima said to Kagami. "That's absurd! Even if that did happen, there's no way he could know!"

"That black shoe over by the curb," said Kuroko. "She lost that when she was thrown into a car. She lost one of her fake fingernails when they dragged her out of the alley. There are scratches from her other nails on the wall here. And she dropped her purse when they jumped her. She . . . oh."

"What's wrong?" demanded Kagami.

He looked over his shoulder as Kuroko held up some sort of a police badge.

"This is bad," said Kuroko. "I'm calling Detective Yagami."

Despite the seriousness of the situation, Takao felt a slight thrill rush through him. This was kind of like being in a crime drama. And he'd heard about this – about how Seirin had gotten involved in a couple police cases and ended up solving them. Because people in the basketball circuit talked. Maybe not to the Generation of Miracles, because there were quite a few grudges held against them, so it was no surprise Shin-chan hadn't heard about this yet, but no one had any problems chatting with Takao, so he'd heard things. Seirin had found out who murdered that guy from Seihou, after their match. Seirin had stopped a kidnapper right outside of the Inter High playoffs, and reunited the little girl with her mother. Seirin had a guy who had Sherlock Holmes level skills of deduction on their team.

And it looked like that guy was Kuroko. Takao was not surprised. He was glad that he'd been close by when Kuroko stumbled onto this. He looked forward to the chance to see him in action.

Midorima didn't look like he intended to deny Kuroko's deductions. That made sense, since Kuroko had just found a purse with a badge in it. Even if you could explain away or convince yourself to ignore the lost shoe or the broken off fingernail, a purse with a police badge in was another story.

"Detective Yagami? It's me," said Kuroko into his phone. "I'm calling to report the abduction of Misora Naomi. Misora-san is an FBI agent, possibly an undercover agent. She was taken from an alley at . . ."

Takao looked around as Kuroko rattled off the address, trying to see if he could spot some clue that could help solve the case, or find something relevant. Unfortunately, he came up blank.

A minute later, Kuroko was off the phone. "Kagami-kun?"

"Tell me what you need," said Kagami.

"A distraction," said Kuroko.

"Who am I distracting?"

It was kind of amazing, Takao thought. Kagami seemed like the kind of guy who would be demanding an explanation, but here he was, being obedient, like a soldier. He was only asking for the information that he needed to carry out the task, and not the reason why he was doing whatever crazy thing Kuroko wanted him to do.

"The people in the convenience store," said Kuroko. "It's probably not necessary, but you get mad at me when I take unnecessary risks. So please distract them while I go in and steal all their security footage."

"Wait," said Midorima. "What are you talking about? What do you want to do that for, Kuroko?"

"One of their cameras is trained right on the street outside of this alley," said Kuroko. "They'll have it on tape."

"And has it occurred to you to just go and ask for the tape?" demanded Midorima. "Or perhaps to let the police ask for it? Use your head, Kuroko!"

"Please use your own head, Midorima-kun," said Kuroko in his usual deadpan voice. "That convenience store is very obviously a front for laundering drug money. They are not just going to give up their security tapes. So I'm going to take them."

"If they're really laundering drug money, which I believe you about, then what you're planning to do is dangerous," said Kagami, darkly. "What if you get caught?"

"I know you don't like me putting myself in danger, Kagami-kun," said Kuroko. "But there's a woman's life at stake."

Kagami's fist clenched tighter.

"I have to do this," said Kuroko. He stared up into Kagami's eyes earnestly. "I can't not do this, Kagami-kun."

"You better not get caught," Kagami growled.

A small almost-smile crossed Kuroko's face. "I won't."

"And if you do, then you shout for help."

"I will."

"Swear it," demanded Kagami.

"I swear," Kuroko said. "If I get in trouble, I promise I'll shout for you."

"Kuroko," said Midorima irritably, "This is ridiculous and dangerous. You are not –"

"He is," said Kagami. "What kind of distraction do you want me to do, Kuroko? Shit, Kuroko? Where –"

"Over there," said Takao, pointing. "He just slipped back inside the store when that glasses guy walked out."

"Idiot," griped Kagami. "Okay, distraction. I need to make a distraction."

Takao saw the lost, desperate look on his face and took pity. "Don't worry, Kagami! I'll help you cause a distraction!"

"You will do no such thing," Midorima said angrily.

"Come on, Shin-chan? Don't you want to get in on the crimebusting too? It seems like fun!"

"Ignore him," said Kagami to Takao. "How are we going to cause a distraction?"

"Alright, come over here," said Takao, hurrying back to stand right in front of the convenience store's doors. Once they were there, he squared his shoulders and braced himself. "Alright. Now. Punch me in the face."

Kagami stared at him. "What?"

"I said punch me in the face. Didn't you hear me?" asked Takao.

"I usually hear punch me in the face whenever you're talking. And I always hear it when the goddamn Generation of Miracles are talking. But it's usually more in subtext," said Kagami, still staring at him like he was stupid.

"Oh, for God's sake," said Takao impatiently. Then he punched Kagami in the face.

Kagami rocked backwards then recovered and acted on instinct. He came at Takao furiously, and Takao had just enough time before his fists connected to think that perhaps he'd made a mistake.

But (Thank God!) at the very last second, something flickered in Kagami's eyes, a realization of sorts. He pulled his punch. A little. It still hurt like heck when it connected with Takao's jaw. But it didn't take his head off. Always a plus.

"You idiot!" snarled Kagami, grabbing him by his collar when he would have staggered and fallen.

Takao shoved him off. "Gotta make it look real!"

Then he tried to tackle Kagami.

_Tried_ being the operative word.

As expected, it didn't really work. But he was willing to bet it made for a good show.

Midorima bought it anyway.

"Stop it! What are you doing! Stop!"

"Stay out of this, Shin-chan!" Takao said then huffed as he took a punch from Kagami to the stomach.

They carried on, with Midorima frantically trying to drag them apart. It didn't work too well for him, and he got a little shoved during the fight, but Kagami and Takao took the worst of it. Well, to be honest, Takao got the worst of it, even though he could tell Kagami was deliberately holding back, and hitting him in places that wouldn't hurt as much.

Takao decided something that day.

He never wanted to fight Kagami for real. There were very few people he felt that way about. He was very confident in his ability to fight smart, or to fight dirty if pressed, or to just be fast enough to get away if he had to, and he'd gotten beat up plenty of times so far in his life, so he was no stranger to fights, and had enough pride to stick through most of them. But Kagami fought like he played basketball. With dangerous intensity, and so much raw power, he was like a wildfire.

Between the punches and the headlocks, Takao had just enough time to wonder just what Kuroko had done to get Kagami practically on a leash. Well, maybe that wasn't a fair way of phrasing it. Kuroko didn't seem to treat Kagami like a pet or servant. Not like Midorima liked to treat Takao. But there was something very fierce about Kagami when it came to Kuroko, and the way he'd snapped to attention when Kuroko simply called out to him in that odd voice was nothing short of miraculous. It had been instantly clear right then that Kagami was fully prepared to demolish anything Kuroko so much as pointed at, without even needing a full explanation, simply trusting that if Kuroko said it had to be destroyed, then it had to be destroyed. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say Kagami was like a Pokemon . . .

And if that thought didn't show that Takao had taken a few too many hits to the head, Takao didn't know what would.

Thankfully, Kuroko reappeared quickly and ended it. And Shin-chan was there to catch Takao when he would have fallen.

"I got all the footage. We should leave quickly," he said. Then he added: "You made a very good distraction."

"Yay! I helped with the crimebusting!" said Takao, feeling inexplicably giddy.

Kuroko stared at Takao for a moment then looked at his partner. "Kagami-kun . . . next time please try not to leave Takao-kun so punch drunk."

"There's not going to be a next time!" Midorima snarled at the same time Takao asked: "Next time? Does that mean I'm on the crimebusting team?"

* * *

><p>"We should turn that footage over to the police immediately," said Midorima when they reached Kagami's apartment. That had been the closest, and conveniently, there were no parents home to fuss over Kagami and Takao.<p>

It was obvious from just looking at them that they'd been in a fight. With Kagami, less so. Takao had definitely come out worse for wear between the two of them. But now they were able to clean themselves up with a first aid kit as Kuroko booted up Kagami's laptop.

"I'll give it to them soon," said Kuroko. "But I want first look at the footage. I found it, after all."

"You stole it," Midorima reminded him. "You didn't find it."

"Meh, same difference," said Takao, cheerfully.

Midorima often felt like he was surrounded by idiots. Since graduating from Teiko, he hadn't felt that way quite so much, but now that feeling seemed to be back with a vengeance.

"It is not the same difference! You are in the possession of information which might save someone's life! You have a moral obligation to turn it over to the police!"

"If I thought they could work fast enough, I would," said Kuroko. "But they have rules and red tape to go through about acquiring evidence and such. I don't."

"I'm going to say this now," said Kagami, looking up from slapping on a few bandaides. "This is not going to be a repeat of that cab driver case. You are not confronting any murders or kidnappers this time. Do you understand, Kuroko?"

"Yes, Kagami-kun."

"What do you mean _this time?"_ demanded Midorima.

"That's not important right now," said Kuroko. He was fast forwarding through the security footage.

"Go bug Kuroko's ex if you want the full story," said Kagami. He moved to join Kuroko in front of the laptop, watching over his shoulder. "Or read a freaking newspaper."

"Oh, is that the thing I heard about from that Seihou guy?" asked Takao. "How Kuroko got himself abducted by that serial killer who was behind those so-called serial suicides?"

"What?" demanded Midorima.

"Yeah, that's what happened," said Kagami, looking disgusted. "He nearly got himself killed."

_"What?"_ asked Midorima again, unable to believe his ears, or recognize the pounding sensation that had just started hammering in his chest.

"No I didn't," said Kuroko.

"Yes you did."

"No. I keep telling you. The pill I had wasn't the poison."

"And I keep telling you, you don't know that!" Kagami said, very angrily.

"What are you talking about?" Midorima demanded. "What poison?"

"It's a long story, and retelling it constantly pisses me off," said Kagami.

"Here," Kuroko said suddenly, pausing the video. The frame froze on an all black car, where two men were dragging a trendily dressed young woman into it against her will. The license plate was visible, but not readable until Kuroko enlarged the picture. Then he pulled out his cell phone and made a call. "Detective Yagami, it's me again. I'm calling to give an anonymous tip."

"Do you know what anonymous means or not?" Midorima wondered.

"He knows. That's his way of being sarcastic." Kagami glared at him. "You've been his friend for two years. Shouldn't you know that?"

Kuroko finished reading off the license plate to this Detective Yagami person, then promised to anonymously email him the footage that he'd stolen from the convenience store. Five minutes after hanging up, he appeared to have done that. Then he turned off the computer and stood up. "Let's go, Kagami-kun."

"And where are we going?" asked Kagami, looking wary but standing and starting toward the door all the same.

Kuroko looked surprised. "To the docks, of course. We need to hurry if we want to get there before Detective Yagami sends any officers over."

"Wait, back up," said Takao. "What's going on?"

"Kuroko, what do you know?" Midorima demanded.

"The car that was used to abduct Agent Misora had a parking permit for the Shiganisa warehouses over near the docks of Tokyo Bay," explained Kuroko.

"Warehouses are a great place to keep someone tied up," said Takao. "I learned that from various movies."

"It might not be so easy," cautioned Kuroko. "They might not be holding her there. But at the very least, we should be able to find out the kidnapper's name, or who that car is registered to. There will be some sort of record there."

"And we're taking these clowns with us?" asked Kagami, giving Midorima and Takao a dubious look.

"Really? We can come? Really?" Takao looked inexplicably delighted.

"We didn't say you could come!" said Kagami. "I was asking Kuroko!"

Midorima scowled and put his foot down. "We are not going with them!"

* * *

><p>"Why did they come with us again?" Kagami grouched. He glanced back over his shoulder at Takao and Midorima, who were trailing behind them, not too far back, only far enough that he could talk to Kuroko privately if he kept his voice low.<p>

"Because Midorima-kun worries about his friends more than he knows how to admit. And because Takao-kun has been a fan of detective stories since second grade," answered Kuroko.

"You know that for a fact, do you?"

"He had a limited edition Detective Trap pin on the jacket he wore when our team played him in middle school," said Kuroko. "You could only get that pin with the purchase of a Detective Trap manga during the month of June, when we were in second grade."

"He could have bought it online or something," Kagami said.

"If he had, he'd have gotten one in good condition, and he wouldn't have put it on a jacket. The one he had was scratched up horribly." Kuroko somehow managed to look disapproving without changing his expression at all. "Those are collector's items now."

"I should learn to stop trying to prove you wrong," muttered Kagami.

"No. You don't have to. I like when you talk to me."

Kagami blushed at Kuroko's blunt and embarrassing way of saying that. Then he sent a backwards glare at Midorima, reminded of just why he hated the Generation of Miracles. He'd known from the beginning that Kuroko hadn't parted from his old teammates on the best of terms. But after hanging around Kuroko so much, the deductive ability was starting to rub off just a little, and Kagami had noticed things and pieced together more than he would have if he and Kuroko weren't running around stopping crimes and playing detective. He didn't have the full story yet, but he was working on it. It was just a matter of time until he figured it out. But it had become obvious that they had done something to really hurt Kuroko and Kagami wasn't going to forgive them for that any time soon.

It pissed Kagami off that something so simple like people talking to him could make Kuroko so happy.

"Kagami-kun."

"W-What?" asked Kagami nervously, trying to convince himself there was no way Kuroko could have known he was thinking about committing armed assault right then.

"If Agent Misora is being held in the warehouse . . ."

"No," said Kagami angrily, eyes flashing. "You're not going in there after her."

"If the police arrive there will be a stand off. Those don't work out as well in real life as they do in movies, Kagami-kun. The hostage usually dies," said Kuroko.

"And what the hell do you think happens to teenagers who sneak into the middle of those situations?" Kagami demanded.

"Nothing, if they're not seen."

"You're not sneaking in there by yourself, Kuroko, damn it!"

"What? What is he thinking of doing?" demanded Midorima, coming forward.

"Nothing. I'm not letting him. You understand me, Kuroko? You are not going to try to infiltrate the God damned warehouse on your own!"

"We'll see," said Kuroko as they kept walking toward the warehouse district.

Kagami and Midorima both proceeded to scream at him how stupid an idea that was and how they would not allow it.

* * *

><p>"He just snuck off and into the warehouse on his own, didn't he?"<p>

* * *

><p>Kuroko knew that it hadn't been easy for Takao to let him go. And the hawk eyed point guard had seen exactly what he was doing. But Takao had seen the validity of his arguments. If this turned into a standoff with the police then Agent Misora was likely to die. Kuroko had the best chance of getting in there undetected, and getting her out. So, Kuroko was grateful to Takao for distracting Kagami and Midorima long enough for him to slip away. And that this time the distraction hadn't involved bloodshed.<p>

There was a drain pipe at one corner of the building that Kuroko was able to climb to get access to the roof. He sent up a silent thank you for all the climbing drills Coach had put the team through. Before joining Seirin, he'd had no idea how to climb a rope. A drain pipe wasn't that different, and Kuroko was light enough that it could support him. It wasn't exactly easy, but it wasn't impossible like it would have been for him in middle school.

There was a skylight on the roof. That gave Kuroko a chance to check and see what was happening inside the warehouse. He approached the skylight carefully, mindful of his shadow, and made sure that when he peeked over the edge that his shadow wouldn't fall inside the window and onto the floor below, giving him away. That would have been horribly ironic. Kuroko mostly saw what he was expecting to see when he peeked in. A woman tied to a chair. And three men who looked like thugs. They weren't torturing her, thank God. Kuroko had no idea how he'd have dealt with the situation if they were. It looked like they were waiting for someone or something. The three men all had weapons. Handguns, which weren't legal in Japan. This was going to be dangerous. But Kuroko had already known that.

He studied the layout of the room. It looked like he could get in through the vent shaft that came down from the roof, but getting out that way would be impossible. It was a ten foot drop. If Kuroko slid out and hung by his finger tips before dropping, he knew he could avoid injury, but there was no way he could get back up to it. The only other way out was through the warehouse doors.

Kuroko took a moment to formulate a plan, assessing what he could do and what he couldn't do. He could get to Agent Misora without being seen, he was certain. He could even get her freed, thanks to the fact that he'd borrowed a kitchen knife from Kagami-kun's apartment, foreseeing that he might have to cut through duck tape or rope.

He could not get Agent Misora to the warehouse door unseen. Nor could he get the doors open without anyone noticing, since they were huge, doors that were probably noisy to open, and would let in a lot more light. And Agent Misora, slender though she was, didn't look like she could fit through the vent like Kuroko could. So even though he could boost her to it, she wouldn't be able to get out that way. And honestly, Kuroko didn't think she could make it that far without being seen.

So what to do?

Think, he ordered himself. This is a chance to balance out some of the wrong I've done. I can't just sit back and do nothing right now. I have to find a way to help her.

But Kuroko couldn't get Agent Misora out of the warehouse. That much was obvious. Or, he couldn't get her out unseen. But perhaps he didn't need to. Maybe it wasn't necessary for her to get out unseen. Kuroko only had to get her out without the thugs stopping her, by shooting her or overpowering her. The easiest way to ensure that didn't happen would be to take the thugs' guns. And Agent Misora would know how to shoot, wouldn't she? She was an FBI agent. Kuroko had seen plenty of TV shows about FBI agents. They all shot guns like there was no tomorrow.

And even on the off chance that Misora didn't know how to shoot, these men probably didn't know that. Or if they did, they probably still wouldn't risk charging her if she had a gun in each hand. That seemed like a good way to get themselves killed.

So, all Kuroko had to do was sneak into the warehouse through the vent, lift the guns off the three thugs' persons without getting caught, and cut Agent Misora free. That was a surprisingly simple plan when it came down to it. Compared to what he was trying to do on the basketball court, defeating all his former teammates and friends, and turning them back into the kind of people who wouldn't hurt and trample other people on a whim, this was positively cake.

* * *

><p>The operation went so smoothly that Kuroko felt a little bit gipped. On TV things never went just the way they were planned. He knew that was to make the plots more interesting, but it was still a little bit of a letdown that all the adrenaline he built up while putting his plan into action only had to be channeled into exactly what it was supposed to.<p>

What happened was this:

Kuroko pried the cover off the ventilation shaft on the roof, then slipped inside. He proceeded slowly to keep from making any unexpected noises, or to make a wrong move that would send him falling twenty feet vertically, or something of the sort. Then he reached the opening into the warehouse, which didn't even have a grating covering it. He waited until all three men were facing a different direction, and one of them started talking. Then he slid most of his body out of the vent, holding on with just one hand. He let his body drop down, still holding on, then released with his finger tips. When his feet hit the floor, he bent his knees to land as softly as possible, going into a crouch.

None of the men even looked his way.

"When's M supposed to get here again?" asked one of the thugs.

"He'll get here when he gets here. He's a busy guy. You know this," was another thug's answer.

Kuroko sent a quick glance at Agent Misora, who was watching the thugs intently, with hate in her eyes. Whoever this M person was, he was certainly not on her Christmas Card list.

The hard part of the plan came next. Pick pocketing the guns. Kuroko didn't have much experience at pick pocketing. He'd read up on it when he first started learning about misdirection. He'd considered that part of his education. But only recently, at Detective Yagami's suggestion, had he actually ever tried practicing it. Not for the purpose of petty theft or anything. Kuroko had no interest in stealing peoples' wallets. But Light had made him see how a skill like that could be useful in their line of work. For instance, if they needed to get a suspect's DNA for testing but didn't have a warrant, it could be very helpful to borrow their watch for the purpose of scraping out some skin cells for a DNA test. Or if they needed to know who their suspect had been calling, that information was conveniently stored in their cell phone.

Technically, that was illegal, but Kuroko had come around to Light's way of thinking where it concerned rules being bent. If he was trying to save someone's life, and there was a rule in his way, he would bend or break it. He didn't need to adhere to some blanket philosophy of something being right or wrong. Kuroko had decided to make decisions like this on a case by case basis. What rules were broken depended on what rules they were and who he was trying to save.

And right now, he didn't think it was wrong to steal illegal guns from some kidnapping thugs and turn them over to a law enforcement agent, in the process of saving that same law enforcement agent's life.

This time it was simple. Kuroko liked simple. He knew that as soon as this little adventure was over, he was going to have a lot of complications to deal with. Kagami was going to be furious, and would shout at him, whack him upside the head, and drag him back to his apartment so he could keep an eye on him. Midorima was going to be angry that Kuroko had done something so dangerous, and confused about why he was so angry. Takao was going to be feeling guilty that he'd let Kuroko go, even if everything did turn out alright, but hiding that guilt with a smile. Coach was going to find out from Kagami what he'd done. She was going to make his life miserable for a week. And Momoi was going to find out from reading the newspapers what Kuroko had done. She was going to be beside herself with worry. And she was going to tell Aomine. And Aomine was going to get that blank eyed stare on his face again, like he'd had when Kuroko and the rest of Seirin had stopped that little girl from being kidnapped, right after Seirin got knocked out of Interhigh. But that stare had come from learning about the other things Kuroko had been up to, not from his team being knocked out of the tournament. Aomine didn't know how to feel about Kuroko running around Tokyo stopping crimes with his new team. He had a mix of complicated emotions that Kuroko couldn't even understand himself. He just knew that Aomine felt them because since crossing paths with that serial killer, it had become a whole lot easier to figure out how other people thought. And how they thought he thought. He could see it all, like a map in his head. The metaphor that the cabbie had used during their battle of wits was a good one, even if it did come from a deranged murderer. It seemed like the man had inadvertently passed his trick on to Kuroko. And Kuroko didn't know how he felt about that. It was ironic in so many ways.

So it was just good that the plan he was enacting right now was simple. He could do with more simple in his life.

Lifting the guns off the three thugs was very easy. It was almost insulting how he could walk right up to someone and take the gun out of their holster without them ever even realizing he was there. A vindicitive little part of Kuroko was glad that they'd be paying for that insult. And he got a rather nice surprise when he turned his attention to Agent Misora. He saw that she was looking right at him.

She didn't seem to know what to think about him. Understandable. It wasn't every day a kidnap victim saw a pale, ghostlike kid appear in the middle of the warehouse where they were being held, and start stealing weapons from her kidnappers. Kuroko could see her studying him, trying to figure out what he was up to and what his motives were. He put a finger over his lip, hoping that she would realize he was on her side and not give him away, then hurried over to her.

"I'm here to help you get out," he whispered into her ear. "But sneaking out's impossible. You're going to have to threaten these men with these guns to keep them out of our way, so we can get to the door.

Misora gave the slightest of nods. Kuroko then knelt behind her and started cutting through the ropes binding her to the chair. A minute later, she was free. But, displaying an excellent mind for strategy and intelligence, Misora stayed seated until Kuroko put a gun in each of her hands.

"Stay behind me, boy. And stay close," she whispered.

"I will," whispered Kuroko.

"Keep that other gun in your hands. Even if you can't shoot, the sight of it will keep them back and away from you."

"Right," Kuroko agreed. Though personally he felt like it was better just to hide the gun under his shirt. These thugs wouldn't even see him. Not if he wasn't carrying a weapon. He estimated that chances of him being spotted if he wasn't carrying a visible weapon, as he and Misora rushed to the door was only two percent. But, carrying a weapon in the open only raised that figure to 4.5 percent. No, only 3.75 percent, Kuroko adjusted his estimate to take into account how beautiful and badass Agent Misora looked with a gun in each hand. The brighter the light, the darker the shadow. The same principal applied now as did on the court. Next to a beautiful, deadly FBI agent in a leather jacket and mini skirt, Kuroko would be his usual invisible self whether he was carrying a weapon or not.

Then Agent Misora stood up. And deviated from Kuroko's script.

"On your knees! All of you!" she shouted, and fired off a round from the gun in her right hand. The bullet hit right between the ugliest one's feet and made him jump.

The thugs stared at her in shock and tried to go for their guns, only to find their guns weren't there.

"I said on your knees! And put your hands on your heads! Now!"

One of the thugs was dumb enough to run. Misora fired off another round and he fell to the ground, then started screaming and clutching his leg, rolling over.

"Anyone else want to run?" Misora asked in an almost friendly voice.

The two uninjured thugs decided that no, they did not want to run. They got down on the ground, hands behind their heads as Misora instructed.

"You, green shirt. Take your cell phone out of your jacket pocket and put it on the ground. Slowly. You make a sudden movement and I'm making a hole in your chest. Understand?"

"Y-Yes," he said, and did as she instructed.

"Now, slide it to me," Misora said when the phone was on the floor.

The thug slid the phone across the floor to her. It came to a stop right beside her feet.

"You boy, call the police."

"Ah! What the – when did he get here? How did he get here?" demanded one of the thugs.

"The police are already on their way, Agent Misora," said Kuroko, but he retrieved the phone nonetheless. As though on cue, a siren started ringing in the distance. Kuroko was pleased that Detective Yagami had taken exactly as long as he'd predicted to piece the thing about the docks together and get here. "Also, I have some friends waiting outside. Is it alright if I open the door, so that they'll know I'm alright, and so the police don't waste time setting up a perimeter when they get here?"

Misora's eyes narrowed at him speculatively. "That's fine. But . . . who are you?"

"No one important," Kuroko said and walked to the door.

"You saved my life. Forgive me if I'm inclined to disagree," said Misora.

"I'm Kuroko Tetsuya. I hope we get along well."

Misora laughed softly. "I don't think that will be a problem."

"I don't think so either," said Kuroko, and he gave her a small smile, because this was a victory. The kidnapped woman was free and safe. The bad guys were in custody. One of them was bleeding, but not dangerously. No one had died. Yes, this was definitely a win.

"You're too young to be a police officer. So what are you doing here? And how did you find me?" asked Misora.

"I found your purse in the alley where they took you. I went from there," said Kuroko, knowing that the full story would have to be told soon, but deciding it could wait. The police were getting closer. And Kagami, Midorima, and Takao were probably all worried out of their minds because of those gunshots. Kuroko quickly walked over to the door and pulled it open, making himself visible to the people outside, so that he could relieve their worry.

* * *

><p>"Amazing," said Agent Misora as Kuroko finished fully recounting the events that took place in the alley, where he'd realized Agent Misora had been kidnapped. "Detective Yagami, you've found an amazing protégé."<p>

"He came to me this amazing," said Light, setting down a cup of black coffee in front of Misora, and a cup of coffee completely loaded with sweetened vanilla creamer in front of Kuroko. "I can't take credit for his deductive skills."

They were in a conference room back at the police station, debriefing. Kagami, Midorima, and Takao were waiting for him outside, even though Kuroko had suggested they return home. He'd warned them that it was likely to be a full hour or more before he was finished here. They hadn't cared. Kuroko knew perfectly well that even if this took until 6:00 am the next morning, and he'd still walk out and find them waiting for him. Them and most of the rest of Seirin. Kagami would have called Riko by now. She in turn would have called all the others. And anyone who didn't have some family obligation keeping them away would be there. That thought warmed Kuroko, even though he felt a bad about inconveniencing and worrying them. He thought this might be what it was like to have a family that cared about him out there waiting.

"Detective Yagami is being modest," said Kuroko. "He has taught me many things since we first met."

Light laughed. And he didn't say it because they were on record and their conversation was being recorded, but his expression clearly said: You mean like how to pick pockets and bend rules?

"He also listens to me," added Kuroko. "And believes me, even if I come to him with something that sounds bizarre."

He remembered clearly what it was like not to be listened to, or to be shut down when he said something that went against the flow. It was nice now to have found people who would listen to what he had to say and not just write his words off as insignificant. And it was even nicer to see the results of what came of speaking up. Lives saved. Bad guys jailed. Children back with their parents.

This was victory, plain and simple.

"For my part of this debriefing, I'll have to backtrack a bit," said Agent Misora, sipping her coffee. "I'll try to be brief. I don't want to keep Kuroko-kun here too late."

"Please don't worry about that," said Kuroko. Even though he felt a little bad about the people waiting for him, he wanted, no needed to understand the full story. "It's not a school night. And I often stay up late."

Misora gave him a nod that was a little bit indulgent, but somehow not condescending. "I came to Japan as part of a taskforce, tracking the operations of an international criminal, believed by many just to be a myth. We, however, believe that he exists, or at least that someone has begun using his alias for their own operations."

"And this man's name is . . . ?" prompted Light.

"He just goes by one name. One letter, actually. He calls himself M."

"M you say?" Light mused.

"Yes. They say he's young. Ruthless. A genius. And completely psychotic, though I don't buy that last one. Sociopathic, perhaps. Even a little mad. More than a little, I suppose. But there's a method to his madness."

Kuroko wasn't the sort of person who believed in premonitions. Instinct, yes. Intuition even. Both were cousins to his own deductive abilities, using information gathered from the environment or precedent to predict the future. But he didn't believe in psychic abilities, or any sort of supernatural way of predicting the future.

All the same, a chill swept down his spine as he heard the description of the man who called himself M. And even though he had no evidence to back it up, no information gleaned from any source reputable or otherwise, Kuroko just knew that his path was going to cross with M's. And that he was going to be in trouble.

* * *

><p>I think I broke my brain writing this. I have no idea how TV show writers for crime shows manage to crank out mystery plotlines so fast. I've literally never had a harder time writing something than this, lol. Hopefully writing mysteries will get easier, because there's alot I want to do with this AU. There are some fun times ahead for Kuroko and Kagami. But there are also going to be some heartbreaking times too. Because Kuroko's premonition about M is right.<p>

Please review!


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